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Works · AB/2026/0033

Ravi Varma Press, kartikeya on a spread of peacock feathers: a many-faced warrior god stands on a peacock whose tail opens behind him like a vast fan, with a cobra coiled below and still water at the base., set in a marble niche

Ravi Varma Press

Kartikeya on a spread of peacock feathers

Lithographic stone

A many-faced warrior god stands on a peacock whose tail opens behind him like a vast fan, with a cobra coiled below and still water at the base. The feathers are drawn one by one, and the black and white of the stone gives the whole image a hard, glittering clarity.

Price · private enquiry₹60,00,000

The price is the house's asking price, given in full, with no buyer's premium. To acquire this stone, speak to Mr. Shyam Babu Naidu, Director. An object of this age falls under the Antiquities and Art Treasures Act 1972, so the house sets out the registration and transfer steps in writing, together with the written record of the stone: its age, its source, and what is not yet known.

The written record

Collection steward, Client AdvisoryMr. Arnav AgarwalThe Ravi Varma Press stones
Director, buying and private salesMr. Shyam Babu Naidu+91 70212 36700

Call Mr. Shyam Babu Naidu, Director · +91 70212 36700

Enquire about this work WhatsApp the house Share on WhatsApp See it on your wall How buying works

The six-faced commander of the gods

AB / MYTH

Om Shri Ganeshaya Namah · Om Namah Shivaya · Jai Shri Krishna

Shri Kartikeya Ji Murugan Skanda

Shri Kartikeya Ji, called Murugan and Subramanya in the south and Skanda across Bharat, is the radiant son of Bhagwan Shiva and Mata Parvati, the Senapati who led the armies of the devas and brought down the demon Tarakasura. His six faces, Shanmukha, watch over every direction at once, and his vahana, the peacock, opens its tail behind him like a halo of living jewels. The cobra beneath is the serpent the peacock is said to conquer: knowledge overcoming poison, light overcoming fear. Vetri Vel, Vel Vel!

The gods and stories in the stones · Raja Ravi Varma and his press · All the stones

Fact sheet

AB / 0033

ReferenceAB/2026/0033
ObjectLithographic printing stone
TraditionRavi Varma Press, the Bombay press founded in 1894 by the painter Raja Ravi Varma
SubjectA many-faced warrior god stands on a peacock whose tail opens behind him like a vast fan, with a cobra coiled below and still water at the base
MediumLithographic stone
Date of this stoneNot yet established. The press dates from 1894; the house does not print a date it cannot evidence
DimensionsTo be measured and given on the written record
ProvenanceSet out in the written record, with what is known and what is not
Photographs and film5 photographs and a breakdown film
Asking priceINR 60,00,000, the whole price, no buyer's premium
Price contextSet by the house. The highest price recorded for any Raja Ravi Varma work is Rs 167.20 crore, for his painting Yashoda and Krishna (Saffronart, 1 April 2026); a painting is a different class of object from a printing stone
LawObjects of 100 years or more fall under the Antiquities and Art Treasures Act 1972; registration and transfer steps are set out in writing
Record kept byMr. Arnav Agarwal, Partner, Client Advisory
EnquiriesMr. Shyam Babu Naidu, Director, buying and private sales, +91 70212 36700

The photo shoot

AB/2026/0033

The whole work, three close details cut from the photograph without alteration, and the work on a wall. Then the film that walks through all of it.

Close detail I of Kartikeya on a spread of peacock feathers
Detail I
Close detail II of Kartikeya on a spread of peacock feathers
Detail II
Kartikeya on a spread of peacock feathers shown on a gallery wall at illustrative scale
On a wall. Illustrative scale: the true size is given on the record once measured.

On record

AB/2026/0033

Reference
AB/2026/0033
Artist
Ravi Varma Press
Title
Kartikeya on a spread of peacock feathers
Tradition
Lithographic printing in the Ravi Varma Press tradition
Medium
Lithographic stone
Being recorded
Year, dimensions, provenance, condition: sent in writing, with photographs, when you request the full record.
Palette
brown, grey, white

Nothing on this record is guessed. Request the full record and it arrives in writing, with photographs, before any invoice.

Enquire about this work

AB/2026/0033

Ask for the condition report, the ownership history, more photographs or a viewing. You are answered the same day by a named person.

There is no deposit and no obligation.

Read by a person and answered the same day. How your details are used

Turn through the house

The other works, each once

  • A square Kalamkari style painting: a saffron yellow elephant face with a blue ornamental ear and white tusks, filled with small gold figures of Shri Ganesha Ji, a drummer and attendants, beside a green leaf band.
  • Unattributed, The golden face with lotus and leaves: a round canvas of a closed-eyed face in gold, covered in black-lined lotus flowers, leaves and scrolling foliage, set on a dark ground.
  • Kiran, A seated winged creature before a field of ink: a square abstract of white, black and saffron, with a pale seated winged creature and a red crest set against a deep brown-black mass.
  • A square Kalamkari style painting: a teal green face in profile with a white tilak; inside it Shri Krishna Ji plays the flute among cows, with devotees at upper left, a white paisley panel and a brown feather panel at the right.
  • Prakash Bal Joshi, Vermilion rising through ultramarine, 2024: a square abstract in ultramarine, violet and teal, with a vermilion form rising through the centre.
  • Chandra Morkonda, The golden tree and the white bull: a tall painting of a great tree with blue-and-gold leaves rising from a golden trunk and tangled roots, with a white lotus bank at the left, a white bull at the right and a crescent moon on a vermilion ground.
  • M. F. Husain, Women dancing before a yellow moon: a framed print of five women with raised arms dancing before a great yellow moon over water, with a boat, two small elephants and a tree hung with cloths.
  • A square Kalamkari style painting: an ivory white face with a vaishnava tilak and a flat orange disc at the mouth, with Shri Hanuman Ji figures with folded hands climbing the right edge beside a gold mandala.
  • Prasad KVS, The flute and the parrot: a landscape-format painting in red, blue and yellow of a blue flute-player in angular, cubist form, with a green parrot perched on a red shoulder.
  • Prakash Bal Joshi, A turquoise river and two gold forms, 2024: gold figures and a gold horizon cross a wide field of turquoise, teal and ultramarine, with plum-violet columns standing at the left and right edges.
  • A wide green canvas: a withered sunflower with a pixelated blue eye at its centre, held between two cupped hands, with tiny figures, grid lines and barcodes.
  • Unattributed, Cows and calf on lapis: a square painting of two white cows and a calf, ornamented in gold, against a flat field of lapis blue.
  • Prakash Bal Joshi, Crimson rain on a lit field, 2015: a tall abstract in crimson, rose and pale pink, with long vertical drips running down over a loose grid of lighter panels.
  • Swati, A rain-washed window onto green: a portrait-format painting of a rain-streaked window looking out onto green trees and a misty park, with water drops in white and black.
  • Unattributed, Maa Durga Ji and her children before the arch: durga with many arms stands in the centre of an arched shrine, flanked by attendants, with Shri Ganesha Ji in red at the left and the lion beneath her, on brown paper.
  • A square Kalamkari style painting: an olive gold elephant face in heavy black outline, filled with pale green figures of dancing and standing Shri Ganesha Ji, a drummer and a trident, beside a gold band and a turquoise leaf panel.
  • Kiran, The Buddha between flame and cloud: a square painting of a grey Buddha head and shoulders beside a red panel, with a glowing flame at the lower left and dark storm clouds above.
  • Unattributed, Shri Krishna Ji with the flute, in gold and vermilion: a square painting of a blue-green Shri Krishna Ji playing the flute, his body filled with small scenes of figures, a camel and trees, on a red and gold ground.
  • Prakash Bal Joshi, Cobalt currents, a gold seam, 2024: a landscape-format abstract in cobalt, ultramarine and pale blue, with diagonal sweeps of the brush and two seams of gold running from lower left to upper right.
  • Unattributed, a woman at the ghat, making her offering: a woman in a white sari stands knee-deep in a river at dawn, lowering an offering of flowers and lamps to the water with one hand and holding a brass vessel in the other, with temples, stepped ghats and umbrellas rising behind her in brown and gold haze.
  • A square Kalamkari style painting: a saffron yellow face in profile with a gold nose ring, a crimson lotus panel at the right, and Maa Lakshmi Ji seated on a lotus inside the contour within a patterned sari border.
  • Unattributed, Morning on the ghats: a landscape-format painting of a ghat on a river, with a sailing boat and ruined sail, stone steps, a fort wall and a palace, under a grey sky with clouds.
  • Thota Vaikuntam, Telangana lady, 2004: a seated woman with an olive-green face, red bindi, stacked gold bangles and a black sari dotted with white, on a cream ground.
  • Unattributed, A woman in a blue sari, worked in thread: a woman seen from behind in a purple blouse and a deep blue sari, a purple flower in her bun and one hand raised to her face, set against dark green walls with carved-stone patterns.
  • Sanjeev Sonpimpare, Embrace in two blues: a square abstract of two rounded blue figures in an embrace, one deep ultramarine and one pale cornflower, beside a large black-and-white printed disc and orange diagonal stripes.
  • Sanjeev Sonpimpare, Embrace beneath the banyan: a square painting of two blue figures in an embrace in front of a banyan with hanging roots, high-rise towers and low rooftops.
  • A square Kalamkari style painting: a turquoise face in profile with a white vaishnava tilak; inside the contour Shri Krishna Ji plays the flute, coiled by a patterned serpent, with devotees at the base and green and orange panels at the sides.
  • Unattributed, the conservatory with a flamingo and orchids: a tall panel of a glasshouse garden under palm fronds and hanging yellow blooms, with a pink flamingo on a pale path, pink and white orchids in the foreground, blue kingfishers and butterflies.
  • Chandra Morkonda, Four elephants and the green tree: a landscape-format painting of a great green tree with a gold trunk, four outlined elephants on a golden ground, a pink lotus and a second tree in pink and orange.
  • A square painting: a large vermilion half face in profile with a green eye, ringed by seated green and yellow deities, with a winged cow leaping over a brown and green chequerboard.
  • Unattributed, Horizon in three panels, orange and black: three canvases hung side by side form one wide landscape: a pale sky, a thin gold line, a textured black band and a field of deep orange over white.
  • Unattributed, Blue panels with a white ring: a landscape-format abstract of overlapping blue panels, from turquoise to navy, with patches of orange, ochre and white, and a small white ring near the top centre.
  • Kiran, A flame in the blue hour: a square abstract in deep ultramarine over a black ground, with a glowing white-and-gold flame form at the lower left and a small red-orange panel at the lower right.
  • Two stylised bulls face each other on a brown ground, their bodies filled with tiny scenes of Hindu deities, with gold and orange bands on horns, necks and legs.

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Enquiries

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Write about AB/2026/0033 and the Client Advisory desk will answer the same day.

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Buying and private salesMr. Shyam Babu Naidu+91 70212 36700WhatsApp
Exhibitions and viewingsMr. Yashwant Naidu+91 98674 36486WhatsApp
Artists and curationMr. Prakash Bal Joshi+91 98690 14555WhatsApp
The FounderMs. Sonu Agarwal+91 75062 45556WhatsApp
The Chairman's officeMr. Ashwin Agarwal+91 93230 05554WhatsApp
Client AdvisoryMr. Arnav AgarwalGet in touchWhatsApp